The Chinese leadership realized one doesn't exclude the other.

Also, a leadership that is so enormously autocratic simply has to juggle fewer balls at the same time.

> ...one doesn't exclude...

Yes, but I don't see that realization as noteworthy. Does history record a nation which never found its own advancement hobbled by the scheming of its petty local officials?

> ...has to juggle fewer balls...

When things aren't going so well, trying to stay in power adds more balls (to juggle) than being an autocracy takes away. And "things aren't going so well" usually indicates that less-competent autocrats are in power - meaning that they are less able to juggle any number of balls.